July 12

"For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"—Matthew 16:26.

How valuable does the soul appear when we contemplate its origin, nature, capacities, and immortal destinies! yet how few ponder the words of the Saviour in the passage before us! We have here

A SOLEMN INQUIRY MADE. "What is a man," &c.

If a man had gained the whole world, he could not enjoy it. Let us suppose an individual having made this conquest. It might perhaps afford him some imaginary pleasure to survey in his own mind how much he possessed; but he could not even behold it with his eyes any other way than in a map, which others may do as well as himself: but as to real benefit, he could enjoy but a very small part of it.

He would not be content with it. "All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full." The pleasures of this world consist more in hope than enjoyment; so that if an individual possessed the whole world, one of the chief pleasures of life would be gone; there would be nothing more left for which to hope. He must be a miserable man, whose desires are not satisfied, while his hopes are at an end; so that if a man could conquer the whole world, as Alexander thought he had done, when that engagement was accomplished, he would do as Alexander did, sit down and weep because there was not another world to conquer.

It would be a curse to him, without the grace of God. "The prosperity of fools shall destroy them." How small a portion of the mammon of this world, in the hands of the graceless, drowns them in everlasting perdition and irremediable ruin! How pernicious, then, would the whole of it be to such characters!

He would have no certainty of keeping it. The supposition of gaining the whole world plainly implies that it is lost to those who had it before. When Alexander conquered Darius, and seized his kingdom, just as much as Alexander gained Darius lost; so that if a man could gain the whole world, this very circumstance would clearly show to him the uncertain hold he had of it. How transitory and evanescent are all things here beneath the skies!

"The spider's most attenuated thread Is cord, is cable, to man's tender tie On earthly bliss—it breaks at every breeze."

It would afford him no consolation in death. Could it calm and tranquillize the mind in the prospect of eternity? Would it not rather plant thorns on our dying pillow? Remember, if the soul is lost, all is lost — the favor of God, the salvation of Christ, the consolation of the Spirit. Commit your soul, therefore, to Him who is willing to redeem it by his grace, and make it a possessor of his glory.